Some best friends get matching tattoos. Others sport necklaces with identical halves of a heart-shaped charm.
But unlikely bosom buddies Laura Ibrahim and Meredith Moore share something far more unique — the father of their kids.
“We’re baby-mama besties,” Moore, 27, told The Post.
“Meredith and I are so close, she’s like my family,” Ibrahim, 30, said with a laugh.
Both moms, who live four minutes apart in Raleigh, North Carolina, have sons with an ex, Kevin, 33, whose last name they chose not to disclose for privacy purposes.
And unlike Nick Cannon’s small army of baby-mothers — including diva Mariah Carey, 53, former Miss Universe contestant Brittany Bell, 34, DJ Abby De La Rosa, 31, model Alyssa Scott, 27, and expecting mom Bre Tiesi, 31 — whom the fertile 41-year-old actor recently said “don’t all have to get along,” Ibrahim and Moore are challenging the idea that baby-mamas are rivals.
Their unconventional camaraderie has even become social media gold. Comical clips of the moms declaring their sisterly love for one another have garnered upward of 2 million views on TikTok.
But their atypical amity didn’t happen in a snap.
In fact, when Ibrahim divorced Kevin in 2013 at age 22, after suffering through their brief, tumultuous marriage, she immediately deemed his then-new girlfriend, Moore, a “bitch.”
“I hated her,” admitted Ibrahim — who had welcomed son Masen, now 9, with Kevin. As a toddler, Masen regularly spent weekends with his dad and Moore, and the couple would plaster snuggly pictures with the tot all over Facebook. The social media posts boiled Ibrahim’s blood.
“She was this 20-year-old hot blond, and I was like, ‘This little girl is trying to play house with my son,’” said Ibrahim, a fiery brunette. “Seeing them on Facebook was like nails on a chalkboard. I was like, ‘Screw this bitch.’”
And Moore fought fire with fire, returning the hostility by refusing to speak to Ibrahim any time she’d join Kevin in dropping Masen off after their weekend visits.
“I hated her too,” she said of Ibrahim. “I was like, ‘Seriously? I love your son. And I’m taking care of him. Why are you hating on me?’”
The flames of their feud intensified over the next two years. The women ferociously exchanged dirty looks and biting epithets any time their paths crossed.
But one day in 2015, when Kevin fell extremely ill while Masen was visiting for the weekend, Moore — who was largely pregnant with her and Kevin’s son, Finnley, now 6, at the time — shared snaps of herself building blanket forts and baking cookies with little Masen. The sweet photos warmed Ibrahim’s once-frigid heart.
“When I saw those pictures, I started to cry,” said Ibrahim, who was also pregnant at the time with another man’s baby.
“I was like, ‘Oh my God, this girl really loves my child. And at the end of the day, what more can I ask for?’” she said. “I thought, ‘OK, Meredith is clearly someone that will go the extra mile to make Masen happy.’”
After the thaw, Ibrahim dropped her weapons of baby-mama warfare and started sending Moore friendly text messages. She even gifted her a Mother’s Day card that year after the blond bombshell gave birth.
The women began meeting up for play dates at the park, allowing their sons to form a brotherly bond. And over time, their kid-friendly outings turned into blended-family dinners, sans Kevin, who wasn’t interested in bridging the gap between his kids’ mothers. His objections aside, the more time the ladies spent together, the closer they became.
“She and I would meet at a [restaurant] and we’d order the same thing, place our napkins in the same place. We did all the same things. It was like looking in a mirror,” said Moore of her and Ibrahim’s connection. “We both knew, deep down inside, that we were staring to become friends.”
Kevin, however, tried derailing their co-parenting progress, according to the women.
“He didn’t think it was cool,” remembered Moore of her baby’s father. “He’d say, ‘Laura’s just trying to get in your head. Y’all don’t need to be friends.’”
But it was Ibrahim who supported Moore when she finally broke up with Kevin in 2017, owing to his overwhelming “toxicity and narcissism.” He’s not currently active in his sons’ lives.
“Laura picked up on signs that things weren’t going so great in [my relationship with Kevin]. So she’d reach out [to make sure I was OK],” said Moore. “She actually drove me [to court] to get a restraining order against him.”
The gesture solidified their best friendship.
“We’re so much alike that it’s crazy. We finish each other’s sentences, we like the same things, do the same things. We’re almost like best-friend soulmates,” gushed Ibrahim, who scoffs at haters who finds their alliance off-putting.
“Everyone, except us, thinks our friendship is weird,” added Moore. “But it was worth it to let go of our anger and bitterness because now, not only do our children have a beautiful relationship, but we do too.”
